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December 28, 2003
Off to London
Checklist for London-
Panicked search for passport, left on coffee table in living room- Done.
Dawdle ripping cd's to iPod, because music is a necessity- Done
Brain cells and cancer explode from paint fumes of the night before- Done.
Last minute purchase of extra camera memory, gifts for niece- Done.
Dog delivered to Daniel, dog giving me the canine finger for forgetting the treats- Done.
Shaving head divot because of lack of attention, blood geysering from skull- Done.
Realizing the sun has set, the vampires are out, and it is time to get to the airport- Doing.
Here's a pic of me and one of the Wau-Wau Sisters. I'd go straight for them. Thanks to cheesedip.com for the pic.
Posted by G at 05:49 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
What a week.
Oof. It is 2:45 in the morning, I'm vaguely woozy, and there was no alcohol involved. Instead of going out with friends this evening, I thought preparing for my trip to London tomorrow would be wiser. This involved things like finding the passport, getting Allegra prescriptions, and filling the holes in the floor with caulk. I was going to paint tomorrow, as Bear will be with Daniel and the roommates will be gone.
I'm just not terribly patient, really. I had to see what the color would look like, so now the room is hazy from the fumes. When Michael comes home, he will open the door to a re-swanked Swanctuary. This will hopefully make living here in the loft a little more surviveable. It definitely looks better.
Having my Texas sister and family in town was nice, but totally exhausting. Bonnie and Co. were really quite self-maintaining and they also found me Jolt Cola. They stayed at my uncle/aunt's place, which is far nicer than my basement abode. This also gave me the opportunity to have downtime, which I really need.
It's quite cool how the annoying pre-teen nieces have developed into really good teenagers. I find them much more fascinating at this age than when they were children. Tomorrow I'm off to see the other niece, who is about six years old, I think. I'm not terribly good at these things, plus they are so charmingly dull at that age. Honestly, even the most intelligent child of six has their mental match in my dog Bear. Unlike Bear, they will progress to the fascinating ages my Texas nieces are presently enjoying, but give me a dog until then.
Posted by G at 02:58 AM | TrackBack
December 21, 2003
Finally
It feels so good to wake up and not sound like a chronic smoker. This morning is the first time in weeks that I haven't lurched up in bed, coughing and bringing up a nice pat of lung butter. Coughing is a great ab workout, but otherwise I'm glad that I'm over this malevolent bug.
It's perfect timing, too. My sister comes into town today, I have two more days of teaching, and I'm really in the mood to get my freak on.
Posted by G at 08:21 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
December 17, 2003
Very confusing
Okay. Scissors, paper, rock. Classic game, easy rules.
Rock smashes scissors. Got it.
Scissors cuts paper. Got it.
Paper covers rock. Huh?
How exactly is this a winning scenario? Gift wrapped rocks are less deadly? The rock can't see where to hurl itself? The rock's breathing apparatus is smothered? When it tries to sneak up on you, it makes crinkling noises?
I've been stuck at the house for far too long.
Posted by G at 04:51 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
December 14, 2003
Weekends are for warriors
I am definitely not feeling like a warrior. This is the third or fourth week of being sick, and I'm really tired of coughing every few minutes. Missed work on Friday and went to the doctor. He said I've got a serious case of bronchitis, here's more antibiotics, a new inhaler thing, and some serious cough syrup. He said what I really need most is lots of rest.
I haven't left the house all weekend. I canceled on all forms of socializing and partying, popped in the netflix rentals (Family Guy Season One and Bend it like Beckham), and chowed down on the grapefruit from Texas that my mom sent me for Christmas. She had no idea that she is my vitamin C dealer. One weird topic- am I the only one who puts salt on top of grapefruit instead of sugar?
Roommate Brian is sick, courtesy of me. I guess I shouldn't have been licking his toothbrush in the morning. He surfaces occasionally, eats something sugar-based, and goes back to sleep. If he were an insect, I'd expect that he was transitioning between larval and pupal stages. Heh, heh, I just love using the verb 'pupate.' Roommate Michael is down in Delaware seeing friends, which gives us an opportunity to leave the toilet lid up. It's been a long time since I lived with a woman, but Michael definitely reminds me of why I stopped dating them. He's a really good person, and I'm really glad he lives with us. Swear to god.
That's the rub of living with roommates. There will always be positive and negative aspects to sharing space. They save me bunches of money, help me in a bind (roommate Michael went back into town and got my antibiotics when I was really sick), and provide necessary conversation during the dull moments. They (and I) can also be randomly bitchy, unreliable, and blind to personal faults. Michael hates leaving the toilet lid up, but never notices the mess he leaves every day on the sink, even though his daily fresh towel could wipe it down. I get annoyed at the endless stream of glasses they use, but totally forget the greasy mess I leave on the stovetop. It's give and take, plus I need to learn to communicate better.
If I could afford it, I would live by myself. I could have wild naked sex when I wanted, frolicking from room to room. I've been wanting that a lot, lately. I could have parties, play music when I wanted, and only be responsible for washing my own dishes. I think I'm just getting too old for roommates. This is why people get married. Living with other people seems so much better when love, or at least sex, is involved. Plus two people could afford more space in NY. Maybe this is why threesomes are so popular?
Posted by G at 12:49 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
December 10, 2003
Nutella smeared all over
My new comfort food- Nutella with Newman-O's. I dip them into the Nutella and eat them. YUMMY.
Not exactly a step towards being svelte, but this is winter, and that is what sweaters are for.
Posted by G at 10:04 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
December 08, 2003
Room with a view
There are rewards to teaching 7th and 8th graders.
Posted by G at 08:47 PM | TrackBack
Uzbekistan, Human Rights Violations
Thanks to John Smart for this news article from OneWorld.net. It has a lot of useful links. The end of the article mentions how Ruslan Shapirov is becoming a central issue.
WASHINGTON, D.C., Dec 8 (OneWorld) -- President Bush's recent vows to pursue a ''forward strategy of freedom" in the Islamic world are in the spotlight as a close ally, Uzbekistan President Islam Karimov, comes under attack by human rights groups.
Despite Western pressure, Karimov has outlawed opposition parties, harassed and imprisoned dissidents, and, despite his own promises, failed to take meaningful steps to stop the routine use of torture against perceived opponents. Scores of dissidents have been executed after sham trials.
Karimov's most recent display of resistance to opening meaningful political space for the opposition--or even for civil-society groups--came late last week when his government blocked the holding of a conference on the death penalty in Tashkent.
The conference, planned for Dec. 5 by a group called "Mothers Against the Death Penalty and Torture," could not be held, authorities told participants the day before, because the sponsoring organization had not been properly registered with the government. Co-sponsors included New York-based Freedom House, which is close to the Bush administration.
In fact, the group had submitted a registration application to the government last January, but had not received any reply--despite a law that requires a decision within two months.
Cancellation of the event drew strong statements from both HRW and Amnesty International.
"This step shows yet again how freedom of expression is curtailed in Uzbekistan," Amnesty said in a statement Friday. "It also highlights the authorities' policy to prevent any public discussion of the death penalty in the country."
HRW noted that the government has a long history of refusing to register independent human rights or other issue-oriented groups, often treating their activities as illegal.
Karimov's intransigeance is embarrassing not only to the Bush administration, which continues to embraces Karimov as a "strategic ally" in Washington's anti-terrorism campaign, but to Western Europe as well.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which held its annual meeting in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent last May, has warned that it would cut its funding to the former Soviet republic unless Karimov met certain "benchmarks" toward human-rights and political reform, including taking concrete steps to end rampant torture of prisoners; registering civil-society groups; and ensuring greater freedom for the media and opposition parties.
But seven months later, human rights groups say the EBRD has nothing to show for its coaxing of Tashkent. If anything, the situation has deteriorated.
"It should be clear to everyone by now that quiet diplomacy simply doesn't work in a country like Uzbekistan," said Rachel Denber, acting director of the Europe and Central Asia division of New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW). "The EBRD would do better speaking out about the alarming lack of progress in human rights, and publicly calling on the Uzbek government to move forward with the necessary reforms."
One of the benchmarks set by the EBRD for continued lending to Uzbekistan was that the government permit independent civil society groups to register and function freely. The Bank said it would have one year to comply before sanctions were taken. "Unfortunately, this is just another example in a long list of setbacks for fulfilling the human rights benchmarks set by the EBRD earlier this year," said Denber. "The international community must firmly and publicly condemn this appalling move and make clear that this type of behavior will seriously affect their relations with Uzbekistan."
While both the U.S. and the European Union (EU) had courted Uzbekistan, the most populous of the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, during the 1990s, its strategic importance emerged more forcefully after the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and the Pentagon.
U.S. intelligence and military forces used former Soviet military bases in Uzbekistan to mount their campaign to oust the Taliban government in neighboring Afghanistan (news - web sites), and have maintained a presence in the predominantly Muslim country.
In recognition of Uzbekistan's importance, Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld was scheduled to visit Karimov in Tashkent to address growing concern over the recent deployment of Russian fighter-bombers at a base in neighboring Kyrgyzstan last week when he traveled to Georgia, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
The visit, cancelled at the last moment due to bad weather over Tashkent, highlighted both continuing U.S. interest in Uzbekistan and the growing rivalry in the region between Russia and the U.S. Both powers now have bases in Kyrgyzstan, and the recent ouster of Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze in favour of a more pro-Washington leadership appears to have prompted growing concern in the Kremlin about U.S. objectives in the region.
Karimov also hosted Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman just last month. Veneman praised the country's leadership, describing Uzbekistan as a "strategic ally of the United States" and offering both food aid and assistance in developing Uzbekistan's agricultural sector. She did not speak publicly about the human rights situation in the country.
Karimov, one of a number of former Soviet leaders in the Caucasus and Central Asia who have maintained their hold on the country more than a decade after the Soviet collapse, is also considered one of those who are most opposed to political and democratic reform.
Despite Western pressure, he has outlawed opposition parties, harassed and imprisoned dissidents, and, despite his own promises, has failed to take meaningful steps to stop torture that is routinely used against perceived opponents, particularly Muslims who practice their religion outside of state-sponsored mosques. Scores of dissidents have been executed after sham trials.
Yet in a recent speech before the National Endowment of Democracy (NED), in which he criticized what he said were decades of Western tolerance for repression practiced by western-allied Muslim governments, President Bush omitted any reference to Uzbekistan, an omission that was quickly seized on by critics both in the U.S. and in the Islamic world as evidence that Bush's rhetoric was hollow.
Human rights groups and regional experts have long argued that Karimov's repressive measures continue to radicalize many Uzbeki Muslims, some of whom have been associated with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), which Bush himself linked to al Qaeda before the Afghan campaign, and other armed groups.
Rights groups have also expressed deep concern about the fate of a prominent human rights activist and journalist, Ruslan Sharipov, who was sentenced to four years in prison in September on what critics say were trumped-up charges of homosexuality. Sharipov is believed to have been beaten and tortured while in custody. His public defender was abducted and severely beaten by men dressed in camouflage uniforms in late August.
In late September, the government also blocked a congress of the opposition Erk Democratic Party, whose activists around the country had reported an increase in harassment.
Posted by G at 08:31 PM | TrackBack
December 06, 2003
Lennon, snow, and bronchitis
I am the hermit, kookoo kachoo!
Posted by G at 02:18 PM | TrackBack
December 02, 2003
Lusting and wandering
The wanderlust started when we were kids. My dad owns a cattle feedlot construction company, and we were always traveling. We lived in every state west of the Mississippi at least for a few months. If we weren’t moving to a new town at the end of a job, we were constantly flying in our family plane to some new place for vacation. Some of my earliest memories are of aircraft, usually connected to memories of my equilibrium-challenged sister barfing. We flew everywhere, with me perched on the suitcases, Debbie reading a book, Bonnie barfing.
Trips with my family are filled with crazy wonderful weird memories. Our dog Missy floating in the air inside the airplane, trying to use canine reasoning to find gravity. My dad calling down the moose from the mountains in Wyoming, biking down Haleakala Crater in Hawaii, learning to scuba dive in Cozumel before it became touristy, my guinea pig dying of heat stroke in Kansas, my sister barfing in my lap as we flew sideways next to the Grand Tetons. Sitting under the stars at the cabin in the mountains of NM, just seeing the tapestry unfold above, wind sighing in the pines, steaming cocoa in your hands.
My mom really wasn’t exactly a traveler, as she was the one who had to do all the grunt work for the big moves. Her family basically got all their moving out of their collective system when they moved from England to the Jamestown colony in 1607. After that they stayed in one place for about 300 years. She loves traveling to Mexico now, but I don’t think she ever really enjoyed most of the trips. Dad would tell us we were going to Yellowstone…right now. My mom was the one that had to pull us out of school, get everything packed, and sort out the details. Dad was the idea man. Good ideas, but I know that mom would have probably been just as happy staying in one place.
I also remember just flying with my dad from state to state. We would have multiple jobs in different states, and I would get to fly with him. Some times it was fun, usually it was me drowsing in the truck waiting for him to finish investigating udder rot. The flying was a fun skill that my dad taught to me. I remember discussing with him the reasoning behind the autopilot system, the gyroscopes, the St. Elmo’s fire. He bought a stunt plane when we lived in Nebraska that had a glass roof and floor, and we would fly to the jobsite upside down. I learned to do rolls, loops, and would get to buzz our town (this was in 4th grade).
I’m afraid I’m a mix of both parents. I like having a place I can call home, but not for too long. I love going to new places, but I would prefer to have a plan. I’m enough like my dad that I often enjoy just roaming. Once I was living on my own, I loved driving across the great undeveloped swaths of the southwest. Stopping in at tiny little state parks, driving through the windmill valley in California, getting lost in Los Angeles. Climbing the tallest peaks in NM, spelunking in the new caverns at Carlsbad with research teams, rafting down four of the highest ranked rivers in the US. Whipping through the s-curves in the Salt River canyon, picking up wildly crazy hitchhikers in Louisiana and Arkansas. Other countries just reinforced my certainty that wandering is a good thing. Every time I did something slightly strange in a foreign country, I was rewarded with something special. The private tours of the Tratyakovskaya Museum in Moscow, getting exposed to mercury by swimming in the Baltic, wandering Paris at night, walking the Muslim haj in Uzbekistan, kissing an Italian in the middle of Leicester Square in a summer rain.
I’m feeling the wanderlust in the worst way right now, like an itch that I just can’t reach. I’ve been in one place for too long. The only reason Texas held me for so long was my university program and property ownership. The maximum I’ve lived anywhere else was two years. New York has so much to discover, but so do other places. Maybe China. Brazil. South Africa. Egypt. India. Maybe I’ll just finish the remaining four states I haven’t seen. I need change soon.
Posted by G at 10:42 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack